In a PC (Personal Computer), a tablet, a mobile terminal device and the like, a display form that a window is displayed on a display screen and an arbitrary application is executed by the window is generally prevalent. The window is an area given to the application on a device such as a display in a window system, and a plurality of applications run concurrently in a multi-task operating system, so that a screen area is allocated to each of the applications in the window to be switched by a user operation.
The window system is a mechanism on a computer in which a unique window is allocated to each of a plurality of tasks in parallel to multiplex screen output and software therefor, and provides a basic support for graphic hardware, a pointing device (such as mouse) and a keyboard.
As to a technology of display control of a system having a plurality of display areas, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2004-29046 discloses a multi-display control system that when display control is performed in a multi-display system in which a plurality of image display apparatuses are connected, an operation screen is moved to the front of an operator when an application for performing a display operation is changed, thus making it unnecessary for the operator to move a display screen.
This system is provided with a main display apparatus and first and second sub-display apparatuses, for detecting where on one virtual page a mouse is and judging that the mouse exists on the second sub-display apparatus from the position detection result. When the judged operation screen is not the main display apparatus, then, screen contents of the second sub-display apparatus and screen contents of the main display apparatus are exchanged, to be displayed on respective display apparatuses. This makes it possible to arrange the operation area indicated by the mouse always on the front and operation efficiency of image display is improved.
FIG. 9A through FIG. 9D are diagrams explaining an example of a conventional operation of exchanging windows.
As described above, it is possible in the window system to display a plurality of windows on a device such as a display to execute applications at individual windows for operation. In a conventional window system, when display positions of individual windows are changed, the positions of the windows are able to be moved arbitrarily by a touch operation or a mouse operation.
For example, when it is desired to switch positions of two windows mutually for easy operation, however, a user needs an operation of moving the windows one by one individually, and further, when sizes of the windows are inappropriate, further setting the sizes of the windows after movement.
FIG. 9A through FIG. 9D show an operation of exchanging a window C and a window A when a plurality of windows A to F are displayed on a display screen 10. In this case, first, as shown in FIG. 9A, the user uses a touch panel function or the like to move the window C to a place of a movement destination by a drag and drop operation.
Further, when the size of the window C is small as shown in FIG. 9B, an operation of enlarging the size of the window C after movement to an appropriate size is performed. Thereafter, as shown in FIG. 9C, the window A is moved to a position of the window C occupied before movement by the drag and drop operation. Finally, as shown in FIG. 9D, an operation of reducing the size of the window A to an appropriate size is performed. The above-described operations require a cumbersome operation for the user, in spite of being the operations of exchanging the positions of two windows.
Moreover, the multi-display control system described in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2004-29046 above is for exchanging images displayed on a plurality of displays connected to a PC but not for exchanging display positions of windows in the window system.